Located on the peninsula, Spain is one of the countries with the best light resources in Europe. In the period of severe power shortage, photovoltaic becomes an important relief way.In the shadow of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, European countries, like Spain, are looking to photovoltaics to fill the energy gap. Pv demand in Europe is surging, and domestic companies are speeding up replenishment of this market.In Spain, where energy problems are already driving up prices, the government wants to generate more electricity from photovoltaics.Since the suspension of Nord Stream 2 last year, electricity prices in the EU have risen rapidly. In some European countries, such as Spain, electricity prices are several times higher in some days than in the same period last year. The energy shortages and the resulting increases in electricity prices have pushed up prices for Spanish consumers, squeezing the purchasing power out of their wallets. Inflation in nine euro-zone countries, including Spain, exceeded 10% in June. Spanish households are starting to think about saving money.
Spain and the eurozone are facing energy shortages triggered directly by the conflict with Ukraine and the EU’s embargo on Russian oil and gas. These bans are intended to reduce the EU’s energy dependence on Russia, but the resulting energy gap is not being filled. Coal, which had been shunned by environmentalists, is also receiving renewed attention.European governments are returning to thermal power generation and aggressively buying coal as a supplementary energy source in preparation for this winter amid gas shortages triggered by the Russia-Ukraine conflict.The Spanish government hopes to increase the supply of other energy sources, such as photovoltaic in clean energy. Within the European Union, Spain’s overall economy is not small, trailing only Germany, France and Italy. It also has some of the best light in Europe and has traditionally been a leader in photovoltaic development, with its ground-based power stations largely free of subsidies.Spain’s approved National Climate and Energy Plan (NECP) shows that the country has a cumulative total installed PV target of 39.2GW in 2030. For 2022, Spain is poised to double its installed capacity to 8GW from 4GW a year earlier.
Germany’s current appetite for photovoltaics is even greater than Spain’s.If before the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Germany’s photovoltaic policy took “de-subsidy” and “marketization” as the main trend, after the conflict, Germany went in the opposite direction, and fiscal expansion and non-marketization measures of increasing subsidies became the means to accelerate photovoltaic installation.In the photovoltaic industry, Germany still has a huge volume of applications, and there is a very large demand potential in the future. It also forms a large historical installation volume, further, it has a large volume and high electricity price to carry the energy storage application and demand.Italy, the EU’s third largest economy, is also highly dependent on Russian gas and its demand for photovoltaics is growing. In terms of cumulative installed capacity, Germany, Italy and Spain are the three largest PV markets in Europe.On May 18th, the European Commission officially unveiled REPower EU, which seeks to diversify its sources of natural gas and oil, as well as to transform its energy mix.The EU has updated its target for photovoltaic installations, which is more ambitious than last year’s plan. Cumulative installed capacity is expected to reach 320GW by 2025 and 600GW by 2030.A small part of Europe’s demand for photovoltaics is supplied by local manufacturers, with Chinese companies filling most of the gap.
Before the Russia-Ukraine conflict, photovoltaic installations in Europe were already on the rise. Europe is a strong advocate of global environmental issues, and the core driver of its photovoltaic industry is the global two-carbon agenda. An estimated 25.9GW of new PV capacity was connected to the grid in the EU in 2021, up 34% year on year and breaking the previous record of 21.4GW in a decade, according to a report by SolarPower Europe. According to China Customs export data, the European market imported 40.9GW PV modules from Chinese PV companies in 2021, up 54% year-on-year from 26.7GW in 2020. After the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, the development of new energy is not only an environmental issue, but also a core issue of European economic security. As a result, Europe’s demand for Chinese PV products has further increased.Customs data showed that in the first quarter of this year, the European market imported 16.7GW of PV modules from Chinese PV companies, up 145 percent from 6.8GW in the same period last year, making it the overseas market with the largest growth. In the first five months of this year, China exported 34GW of components to the European region, up 129% year on year. In May alone, Chinese PV module exports to Europe reached 9GW, up 15% from the previous month.
Post time: Oct-21-2022